April 16, 2016

Aquasport 4

I’ve never entirely trusted outboards–with ample reason born from experience–and last season a fuel problem left me inconvenienced, though certainly not endangered. So I decided to add a kicker bracket so I could have get-home power if required.

I chose the port side of the transom for the installation and, following the instructions, I determined the mounting height of the bracket and marked the hull accordingly. Knowing the transom was cored, I bored out the fastener hole locations with a 1″ bit to remove core, which turned out to be some sort of foam, possibly Airex. Then, I filled the voids with thickened epoxy. When the time came to install the bracket, the 3/8″ bolts could pass through the center of the epoxy-filled area, thus obviating any chance of water leakage into the core.

The layout process highlighted an issue with the boat and bracket: the bracket handle interfered with the gunwale assembly, so the bracket wouldn’t operate properly as is. I’d have to add blocking beneath the bracket to keep it clear of the gunwale, and determined I needed a full 1-1/2″. I thought of using some leftover teak that I had on hand, but decided instead to build the block from two layers of 3/4″ fiberglass sheeting, which I glued and clamped together with epoxy.

I’d complete the bracket installation later, once the backing block was ready, the epoxy plugs were cured, and I had the proper fasteners on hand.

Meanwhile, with new registration numbers now on hand, I installed them, a nice improvement over the old hardware store stick-on letters.

With no further need for the boat indoors, I moved it out to make room for another project. I liked the new appearance and felt it made a significant different to the overall feel of the boat, just as I’d hoped. The devil is in the details.

Total time billed on this job today: 2 hours

0600 Weather Observation:
30°, clear. Forecast for the day: Breezy, sunny, high in the 50s